Uploaded December 2015 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Bottomswell with an unpronounceable name :D
\\Illuyankas//
HP: 13,700 (Aquapolo: 210HP)
So this fellow caused a fair few headaches with his AI, as I wanted him to not get locked in an endless loop of charging Aquapolo too
early in his 2nd attack cycle which needed a bit of jury-rigging. After ditching several rewrites of his AI, I finally figured out how to get what I was after. He'll now hold on the Aquapolos until he's had a full run on his attacks and will reset to 'Calm' after all this until he hits 1/4HP for the final phase.
The rest is in the stats & attacks. Like in vanilla, Illuyankas is flagged as 'unreachable' which means only long range attacks can hit him. And with the removal of Long Range Materia, this means that having fighters in the Front Row offers no real advantage outside of building Limits, so I've specced his physical attacks to hit hard enough to give grief to a back row party.
On the magic-side, he's got some new heavy-hitters to make use of. Cyclone is a single-target magic attack that can inflict Confuse,
while Wells Breeze hits the entire party for light damage with a chance of Sleep. Both are Water/Wind elemental, so Choco-Mog with Elemental in your Armor can half this damage down, or Aeris can absorb them with her Geo Stance.
When brought down to 3/4HP, he will enter his 2nd phase and become visually more agitated. He'll open from here with a triple
helping of Selenostrike that will inflict Silence + Darkness so having your Star Pendant equipped on the caster along with a healthy supply of Echo Drops (available from nearby stores and enemies) is a good idea.
After running through some attacks, he'll pop off his infamous Aquapolo. This is an attack similar to Reno's Pyramids that lock a character in place, but with the additional effect of draining down their HP with an anti-regen effect. The Aquapolos are also immune to physical attacks, but can be targeted with multi-target spells like Matra Magic and are weak to Bolt.
From here, it's the beginning of the end. He'll alternate from Aquapolo casts to Illuya Wave, a magic-based attack that will hit the party for moderate damage. He will use one of these as a final parting attack when killed, so it's a good idea to use Sense early on and keep tabs on his remaining HP as you run this fight in.
For attacks, Lightning and Wind are effective so Bolt and Choco/Mog are the order of the day here, with the latter delivering a good chunk of damage. Having either paired with Elemental in the weapon can help physical attackers like Yuffie land harder hits (as seen). You can also use Poison, albeit at half-effectiveness; Dirty Bombs are sold in this town, which have a 100% poison chance (but lower base damage than a normal grenade). Illuyankas also reduces damage from Fire and ignores Earth, Water, and Gravity attacks.
Party-wise, any of the characters currently available are viable choices here. Cloud, Tifa, and Red XIII have decent Magic utility, Yuffie and Barret both have ranged weapons, and Aeris can tank out the Water/Wind elemental attacks that Illuyankas throws at you. This is also the first boss fight after the Rank-Up; I'll be
running with the 'default' builds for these videos.
The reason I used Yuffie and Barret here was to emphasise the difference in their stats. Where Barret is taking noticeably less damage, Yuffie is notably much faster and can sneak in an extra turn past him. This is a combination of their natural stats, the Rank choice I made, and the equipment they're using to create two 'extremes'; a fast character and a slow/tanky character. This was much harder to do in vanilla, as stat bonuses on equipment and differences in the characters weren't pronounced enough.
So there's that.
Oh, and I adjusted the CPR 'minigame' so that Cloud is SO GOOD at blowing air into small girls that it only takes one uncharged breath to revive Priscilla. Attaboy, Cloud.
Bottomswell with an unpronounceable name :D
\\Illuyankas//
HP: 13,700 (Aquapolo: 210HP)
So this fellow caused a fair few headaches with his AI, as I wanted him to not get locked in an endless loop of charging Aquapolo too
early in his 2nd attack cycle which needed a bit of jury-rigging. After ditching several rewrites of his AI, I finally figured out how to get what I was after. He'll now hold on the Aquapolos until he's had a full run on his attacks and will reset to 'Calm' after all this until he hits 1/4HP for the final phase.
The rest is in the stats & attacks. Like in vanilla, Illuyankas is flagged as 'unreachable' which means only long range attacks can hit him. And with the removal of Long Range Materia, this means that having fighters in the Front Row offers no real advantage outside of building Limits, so I've specced his physical attacks to hit hard enough to give grief to a back row party.
On the magic-side, he's got some new heavy-hitters to make use of. Cyclone is a single-target magic attack that can inflict Confuse,
while Wells Breeze hits the entire party for light damage with a chance of Sleep. Both are Water/Wind elemental, so Choco-Mog with Elemental in your Armor can half this damage down, or Aeris can absorb them with her Geo Stance.
When brought down to 3/4HP, he will enter his 2nd phase and become visually more agitated. He'll open from here with a triple
helping of Selenostrike that will inflict Silence + Darkness so having your Star Pendant equipped on the caster along with a healthy supply of Echo Drops (available from nearby stores and enemies) is a good idea.
After running through some attacks, he'll pop off his infamous Aquapolo. This is an attack similar to Reno's Pyramids that lock a character in place, but with the additional effect of draining down their HP with an anti-regen effect. The Aquapolos are also immune to physical attacks, but can be targeted with multi-target spells like Matra Magic and are weak to Bolt.
From here, it's the beginning of the end. He'll alternate from Aquapolo casts to Illuya Wave, a magic-based attack that will hit the party for moderate damage. He will use one of these as a final parting attack when killed, so it's a good idea to use Sense early on and keep tabs on his remaining HP as you run this fight in.
For attacks, Lightning and Wind are effective so Bolt and Choco/Mog are the order of the day here, with the latter delivering a good chunk of damage. Having either paired with Elemental in the weapon can help physical attackers like Yuffie land harder hits (as seen). You can also use Poison, albeit at half-effectiveness; Dirty Bombs are sold in this town, which have a 100% poison chance (but lower base damage than a normal grenade). Illuyankas also reduces damage from Fire and ignores Earth, Water, and Gravity attacks.
Party-wise, any of the characters currently available are viable choices here. Cloud, Tifa, and Red XIII have decent Magic utility, Yuffie and Barret both have ranged weapons, and Aeris can tank out the Water/Wind elemental attacks that Illuyankas throws at you. This is also the first boss fight after the Rank-Up; I'll be
running with the 'default' builds for these videos.
The reason I used Yuffie and Barret here was to emphasise the difference in their stats. Where Barret is taking noticeably less damage, Yuffie is notably much faster and can sneak in an extra turn past him. This is a combination of their natural stats, the Rank choice I made, and the equipment they're using to create two 'extremes'; a fast character and a slow/tanky character. This was much harder to do in vanilla, as stat bonuses on equipment and differences in the characters weren't pronounced enough.
So there's that.
Oh, and I adjusted the CPR 'minigame' so that Cloud is SO GOOD at blowing air into small girls that it only takes one uncharged breath to revive Priscilla. Attaboy, Cloud.
